Commentary on “Assessing the Field: An Oral History Interview” (Volume 23, No. 1, 1992)

Canadian Review of American Studies Volume 23, Number 3, Spring 1993 Reactions: Thoughts From Our Readers Commentary on "Assessing the Field: An Oral History Interview" (Volume 23, No. 1, 1992) Regi,nald Stuart,Maunt St. VincentUniversity 213 Professor Gary Kulik's role as editor ofAmerican Quarterly gives him a wide perspective on the broad trends in American Studies over the past decades. I read his remarks as a species of historiography, especially his reflections on how the recent emphasis on social history has permeated cognate disciplines . The American Studies movement originally attempted to link historical and literary analysis, but, beyond that, his point about the need for synthesis in a fragmented field resonates for virtually any scholar in the humanities and social sciences these days. The founders of American Studies, the "myth and symbol" writers, cannot be left in some dustbin, but I'm curious where Leo Marx and Henry Nash Smith thought the field would go? Did they see themselves as clockmakers who set the mechanism ticking, and then pursued their focused concerns while the wheels ground on? Or, is their status as founders somewhat accidental? Have historical and literary analysis become intertwined, or merely better neighbours? Will applying structuralism to historical documents , as Albert Tillson, Jr does in Gentry and Common Folk (1991, see especially ch. 8), help to integrate other disciplines into American Studies. Tillson applies Claude Levi-Strass' sanalytical methods to eighteenth-century journals to verify the political-ideological changes he had discovered using more conventional analysis. How far towards generalization can such a focused methodology take us? 214 CanadianReviewof American Studies It seems clear to me that over the years scholars have devised and applied new intellectual and methodological systems far more easily than they have the kind of embracing interpretations Marx and Strauss essayed. The "studies" idea was to interrelate disciplines. But how elastically defined is "studies?" Professor Kulik offers useful suggestions, but it seems a pity to me, despite his conviction that the concerns of economics and political science , or sociology,place them on the fringes of American Studies, that such disciplinescannot find room under the rubric of American civilization. What more inclusive term could we have than "civilization," after all? The term "culture" should also have an inclusive definition. By culture, Professor Kulik seems to mean literary and artistic producers and products. Well, what kind of producers for what kind of markets? Mass and elite culture overlap in many areas, such as reading habits, a sense of what does, or does not, constitute art, leisure activities, or a pleasing and useful architectural style.This, along with the other problems Professor Kulik mentions, complicates the creation of an overarching view of American society. Given the volume and diversity of work published over the past decades, a manageable and digestible overall synthesis may well look superficial, shallow, whereas an adequately developed interpretation will be extraordinarily complex and weighty.Within the discipline of history, this volume and diversity means that any single individual simply cannot cover and digest the material to produce broad perspectives (see, for example, volume 79 of the Journal ofAmericanHistory).In my opinion, that is why textbooks these days tend to be written by committees. The infighting among successive generations, or contemporaneous factions , of scholars also complicates the search for synthesis. Historians may not respect their intellectual elders any more than literary types. I can certainly recall awkward moments at historical conventions when young pups barked around their elders with less deference, regard, or good manners than civilized academics expect from one another. Furthermore, historians often begin arguments with a ritual denunciation of accepted interpretations . That was especially true of the vitriol the so-called New Left school·tossed to dissolvethe assertions of their elders. For the most part we have moved beyond the great person approach to the past. Leaders in any field nevertheless remain the most obvious indi- Reactions:ThoughtsFrom OurReadersI 215 viduals of any place and time to study. But we have also unearthed the less obvious, as Professor Kulik points out, and feminist scholarship has forced many to reconsider their subjects, look for the currents that swirl beneath the surface, and accept the darker forces that grip us...